It would be convenient to point to the Steven Stamkos injury as a major reason the Tampa Bay Lightning are struggling, but it doesn't explain the entire story.
Of course, losing their captain and offensive superstar hurts the Lightning, especially since he had been playing some of his best hockey in two years before the injury. But the Bolts have been a resilient bunch that was able to survive key injuries before. Tampa Bay reached Game 7 of the Eastern Conference finals last season, and the Lightning were without Stamkos until the final game of that series.
"We've been able to do it in the past,'' Lightning GM Steve Yzerman told ESPN.com on Tuesday. "Even with Stammer or other players being injured, we've been able to generate offense, get enough production and ultimately play well defensively and keep the puck out of our net to win games."
A popular preseason pick to challenge for the Stanley Cup, the Lightning have lost seven of their past eight games and sit 12 points behind the Atlantic Division-leading Montreal Canadiens. The Stamkos injury aside, Tampa Bay's slide is puzzling. This is a deep, talented lineup with a great coaching staff, a team that reached the Cup finals two years ago and fell one win short of a return trip last season.
"We need to get a bit more offensive production out of our top-nine forwards," said Yzerman. "We need more out of them. But mostly, it's our play defensively as a team that has to improve. That's what is hurting us the most.''
The ingredients are there. But as Yzerman said, it starts with a better defensive effort.
"We're not going to win many 6-5 games," said Yzerman. "We're falling in some categories -- our penalty killing is dropping, our goals against, our shots against. We're in the bottom half of the league now in those three categories, and those categories have to be good in order to win.''
Goalie Ben Bishop is not playing nearly as well as he was last season, and I can't help but wonder if the pending unrestricted free agent isn't distracted by his cloudy future. He almost was traded to the Calgary Flames last June, a deal that fell through because he couldn't come to terms on a contract agreement with the Flames. The Bolts then signed younger goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy to an extension during the offseason. The writing's on the wall, in all likelihood, for Bishop -- whether it's in the form of a trade before March 1 or simply that he will walk away as an unrestricted free agent next July 1.
Bishop can only help his stock by playing better. Not only will that attract trade suitors, it will also improve his contractual leverage for his next deal if he gets back to the level he was at a year ago.
Yzerman refused to single out players, but rather stressed the collective need for Tampa Bay's entire roster to be better. And there's no doubt the team can be better in front of its goaltenders.
In the meantime, Lightning fans would love to see their GM make a trade. Who can blame them? But as we've seen around the league during the opening few months of the season, the cap system has had a paralyzing effect on big moves. Teams are waiting until closer to the March 1 trade deadline, when some bottom-feeding clubs finally give up on the playoff chase and put players up for sale. The parity throughout the league means that almost no one has raised the white flag yet. And it takes two teams to make a trade.
"We're constantly looking at ways to improve our team," Yzerman said. "We've lost seven out of eight. But it really doesn't change what we're trying to do or what we'd like to do. We have areas we'd like to address with our team, whether that's from within the organization with the players we have, or seeing if we can do that out there on the trade market. If there's something that makes sense, we're prepared to do that. But it's difficult to find a partner for it to make it work. Everybody has concerns about the salary cap; everyone has concerns about the expansion draft. It is difficult to make a trade.''
Yzerman, who keeps his cards close to the vest, wouldn't specify the team's trade needs. But I'm confident that a top-four defenseman tops his wish list. It's been a missing piece for this team for quite some time. And since a bunch of other teams also covet elite D-men, they're a prized commodity and thus difficult to get -- which means there's no guarantee that the Lightning will be able to score one before the trade deadline.
But you can bet Yzerman will continue to work the phones.
"Again, we'd like to think we know what our team needs," said Yzerman. "We'd like to think we know our players well and how we can help our team improve. But as I've said time and time again, I've got to find someone who's willing to work with me.''